


One Too Many Mornings

by bashert



Category: The Newsroom (US TV)
Genre: F/M, Poor Maggie, a sequel of sorts, post Election Night
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-27
Updated: 2015-04-27
Packaged: 2018-03-26 02:34:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3833761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bashert/pseuds/bashert
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>But Maggie was not firing on all cylinders. And because her brain was working at a slightly slower pace than normal, what she thought she heard was MacKenzie's voice telling to come in, when what she actually should have heard was Mac asking her to give them a minute.</i>
</p><p> </p><p>Maggie wakes up on MacKenzie's couch.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One Too Many Mornings

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



> This is a sequel of sorts to "Honey Come Home." I made a promise to Clare that I would write this if she would also write a sequel. This my end of the bargain. The title is from Bob Dylan. But an honorable mention to Emily C's suggestion of "Not Worth it for an Advil."

Maggie was aware of two things when she woke up: one, her head was fuzzy and she wasn't sure but there was a solid chance that she could be dying, and two, this was not her bed.

It came back in pieces.

She was not at home. She was at Mac's. She and Mac had gotten incredibly drunk, and she ended up on MacKenzie's couch.

"Okay," she told herself. "You can do this. You can sit up. Because sitting up leads to water and Advil and possibly a breakfast sandwich and those are all _good_ things."

Groaning, she straightened, but drew the line at standing. She glanced down the hall towards Mac's bedroom. The door was still shut, and she didn't want to wake Mac, but she was pretty desperate to know where Mac kept the ibuprofen.

Two more minutes, she thought to herself. Two minutes more and then she'd go in.

Maggie managed to climb to unsteady legs, and grabbed a bottle of water out of Mac's fridge, draining it almost immediately. Her mouth felt like the fucking Sahara, but now that she had some water the more pressing concern was her pounding head. It felt like it was going to crack in half. She needed Advil. The situation was becoming dire, and if she wanted to remain a remotely functioning human, she was going to need Advil _immediately_.

She debated, briefly, how comfortable she felt going through her boss's medicine cabinet before deciding that Mac would understand (fuck, Mac was bound to be in worse shape than she was. Maggie was pretty sure that Mac had still been drinking when she passed out on the couch).

No Advil. No Advil or Tylenol, or anything resembling a pain reliever was anywhere in the bathroom.

 _Shit. Shit, shit, shit._ Maggie was going to have to knock on the door. She couldn't even fathom leaving the apartment to go out and try to find ibuprofen. She was barely putting one foot in front of the other at the moment. Her head felt like someone had shoved cotton balls in there, and then decided to get them all out by using a jackhammer.

Maggie squared her shoulders and knocked lightly on Mac's bedroom door. If she had been in better shape, if her wits had been about her slightly more, she might have heard the muffled thud behind the door, followed by giggling, then shushing, then another thud, and possibly even the low rumble of Will's voice.

But Maggie was _not_ firing on all cylinders. And because her brain was working at a slightly slower pace than normal what she _thought_ she heard was MacKenzie's voice telling to come in, when what she _actually_ should have heard was Mac asking her to give them a minute.

It was, Maggie said later to the agreement of most who knew her, the kind of thing that would really only happen to her.

Because she was _not_ greeted with a hungover MacKenzie, a pillow over her head, Advil within arm's reach, cursing both the alcohol and the day Will McAvoy was born. Instead, she was greeted by both of her bosses, not a stitch of clothing between them, Will's head buried between MacKenzie's legs, and a look on Mac's face that was two parts pleasure and one part mortification.

"Maggie!" Mac exclaimed, and Will's head shot up from where he was hard at work, and Maggie willed her feet to move, but she was frozen in horror. Mac scrambled to grab a blanket, and Will, panicked, spun around giving Maggie quite the show (and part of her wanted to smirk at MacKenzie, because she had heard rumors that Will was blessed with more than just intelligence and good looks, and now it was _confirmed_.)

"I'm...I'm so..." Maggie sputtered. _Jesus Christ, Jordan, get the fuck out of here,_ she thought. But for some reason there was a gap between what she should be doing and what she was actually doing, and her legs were refusing to listen to the klaxons and alarms going off in her brain. _Cover your eyes,_ her brain commanded. And yet. She stood there, rooted to the spot, her eyes wide and her mouth gaping.

It was Will who moved first, darting into the bathroom, the door slamming behind him.

"He was...apologizing," Mac explained, her face red (whether from exertion or embarrassment, it was hard to say).

"I'm _so_ sorry," Maggie finally got out. "I'm so sorry. I just needed Advil and you didn't have any in your bathroom, and I just... _fuck_."

"I'll grab you some," Mac promised. "I'll bring it out to you." Mac looked pointedly at the door, and finally, blessedly, Maggie's legs became unstuck and she backed out of the bedroom, nodding like an idiot. She closed the door behind her, making a beeline for the couch and wondering if it would be more or less awkward to leave before they came out of the bedroom.

If she left she'd still have to see them at work on Monday (unless she quit her job. She could quit her job. Seeing both bosses in the nude was certainly a good enough reason to resign), but if she stayed she would have to see them _now_.

Maggie was still weighing the pros and cons of staying or leaving when the bedroom door opened and Mac came out, now wrapped in a robe, with a sheepish look on her face and the bottle of Advil in her outstretched hand.

"Seriously, I am just so, unbelievably sorry. I thought I heard you say come in, but of course you _didn't_ , because you were preoccupied, and I just had such a terrible headache and I couldn't find it and I just...I'm just really sorry," Maggie rambled.

"It's okay," Mac held up a hand to stop the stream of words falling from Maggie's mouth. "I mean, it's not, but it's... _I'm_ sorry. We shouldn't have...not with you on the couch...and I just..." Mac trailed off, fiddling with her engagement ring.

"I should go," Maggie said suddenly.

"Oh, right. Are you sure I can't make you breakfast?" Mac offered, and Maggie really couldn't think of a single thing that she would want to do less than sit down to breakfast with Will and MacKenzie (particularly because it was an image that she could not get out of her head. It was stuck there. The scene playing on a loop. She now knew what both Mac and Will looked like naked, and it was a sight that she couldn't unsee).

"No, nope, no, I'm good," Maggie was aware of the manic smile on her face, but she just wanted to get out of there before Will appeared.

"Maggie, good morning." Too late. Will appeared with a wry grin and Maggie wondered what in the hell she had done to deserve this fate.

"Hi, Will," Maggie replied. "I'm going to go. I'm..going." She gestured helplessly towards the door.

"You won't stay for breakfast?" Will deadpanned, lifting an eyebrow. Maggie had to admire the way that he was absolutely refusing to be embarrassed, unlike his fiancée who was becoming redder by the second.

"I have..." Maggie struggled to come up with an iron clad reason to leave. "I just have to go."

"Thank you, for last night," Mac said as she followed Maggie to the door. "And sorry about..." Mac waved her hands back towards the bedroom and bit down on her lip.

Unsure what else to do, Maggie just nodded, clutching the door knob like a lifeline. She thought she should say something, but she was having a hard time forming sentences.

"I'm glad you worked things out," Maggie finally said, filling the awkward silence. "I'll see you later." She finally managed to slip out the door, and she heaved a huge sigh of relief.

She really could use a drink.

* * *

 

Monday had Maggie contemplating playing hooky before deciding that the longer she put off seeing Will and Mac the more awful it would become.

 _Like a Bandaid_ , she told herself. _Just rip it off_. Maybe she could avoid being alone with either one of them.

When she made her way into the office, she was first stopped by Tess.

"Mac was looking for you," Tess told her, and Maggie groaned. There went her grand avoidance plan.

She dropped her things off at her desk, and walked slowly towards Mac's office, dragging her feet as if she was heading toward the gallows.

It was her worst nightmare, basically, because it was not just Mac in the office, but Will too. And Maggie suddenly would rather be, oh _anywhere_ else, than in MacKenzie's office with the two of them.

Swimming in shark infested waters? Sure. Trapped in a minivan with a bear? Okay. It was better than what was waiting for her on the other side of that door.

She knocked lightly on the door, and Mac called for her to come in.

"Tess said you were looking for me?" Maggie started, and Will and Mac shared a look and then Mac stood, twisting her ring in what Maggie now recognized as a nervous habit.

"We," she motioned to Will, "really just wanted to apologize again for the other morning."

"It's fine," Maggie began. "Well. It's not _fine_ , but it's fine."

"We should have taken into consideration that you were on the couch," Will jumped in. "And I should have remembered that Mac doesn't have locks on her goddamn doors." Mac shot him a glare.

"But it was irresponsible of us," Mac continued.

"And we're sorry," Will said, "if for no other reason than we were interrupted..."

"Will!" Mac admonished, spinning around to face him.

"Guys!" Maggie called out. "It's fine. Let's just all forget it happened. I mean seriously, let's never mention it again. Never. Ever. _Never_."

A look of relief washed over Mac's face.

"Never?" She clarified.

"Never," Maggie confirmed. "I'm just going to go now, okay? And we're _never_ going to mention it again. Are we clear?" Both Will and Mac bobbed their heads in unison. "Great. I'll see you at the rundown meeting." And she hurried out the door before either could say another word.

"What was that about?" Tess asked when Maggie settled back down in her chair.

"A story we were thinking about covering," Maggie replied, trying her best to keep her voice breezy. "But it turns out, it never happened."  
  



End file.
